


DISTANCE AND WEIGHT

by spicyshimmy, stonelions



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, M/M, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-14
Updated: 2012-11-14
Packaged: 2017-11-18 15:17:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/562482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spicyshimmy/pseuds/spicyshimmy, https://archiveofourown.org/users/stonelions/pseuds/stonelions
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kaidan's dad stays, but only for a little while. Shepard shows up, but never according to plan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	DISTANCE AND WEIGHT

**Author's Note:**

> This fic takes place post-high school graduation, after Shepard and Kaidan's first break-up that summer. ...Which we'll write more about later. ...Soon.

January always stood out stark after December. It never felt new to Kaidan, more like a month of things going back to how they normally were. In January, you went back to school. The living room went back to its regular configuration. No more foresty green smell filling the downstairs, and no more tracking pine needles all over the house. The baking got less interesting and less frequent, and the fancy holiday cookbooks went back on the shelves upstairs out of the way. No more rum and eggnog, though there would still be apple cider until the weather started to warm up in March.  
  
And Dad went back to Cambridge, like every January as far back as Kaidan could remember.  
  
It was their last dinner together before he left. Shepard had to work and couldn’t come, so there was no extra nervous energy to cut the tension in the room. Only the same old weight of distance and months and years that built up when life went on unaccounted for on opposite sides of the globe.  
  
Most of what they had to talk about had been exhausted within the first week of dad’s stay. “How did your exams go? What are you taking next semester? Any plans yet for a major?” And that was only the comfortable, impersonal stuff. The second week they’d moved on to the personal. “So you’re seeing that boy still? I thought you two had called it off. He doesn’t have much to say for himself, does he?” And of course, Kaidan’s favorite: “You’ve put on weight again.”  
  
That one stung. It lingered. It followed Kaidan around and made him miserable every time he got hungry. He ate anyway. Like right now; he felt guilty, but he was still digging into his mashed potatoes. The only way to avoid how awkward the dynamic in the room felt was to keep your mouth full. A good non-verbal excuse.  
  
The one thing that was left of normal in January was Mom. She was sad. It happened in September too, but only a little. She’d told Kaidan once that it was because Dad’s summer stays were longer and they had more time to get fed up with each other. It sounded like an old joke between his parents, something that preceded him. The stretch between January and mid-March was grey and grim, though, and sometimes Dad didn’t come home until June, if he had summer sessions or conferences.  
  
Kaidan wondered how his parents managed that kind of time apart. His mom was one of the strongest people he knew. She was stoic about it in spite of being sad, and if she ever cried when dad left, Kaidan hadn’t seen it. January was for stoicism. It was for knuckling down and getting through the dark and wet of winter so you could breathe deep again when the crocuses poked up through the front lawn come spring. The rain would keep falling, that was a constant, but it was kinder in the springtime. It made everything new. That was when things felt new.  
  
“You got new glasses,” his dad said suddenly.  
  
Kaidan looked up. Nobody had spoken in several minutes. “Uh. Yeah,” he said. He’d bought the frames for Fall, part of his attempt to purge his bad summer and leave it behind. Liara had helped him choose them. The old frames had toughed out all of high school with him but it had been time for a change.  
  
“Huh,” Dad said. Then he went back to eating his brussel sprouts.    
  
That was about how it went with Dad.  
  
Mom sipped her glass of wine and raised one fond eyebrow at Kaidan. This was their shared unspoken language, their long-running joke: _Your dad never notices anything, does he._

At least he hadn’t said anything about Kaidan’s hair.

The Shepard stuff was understandable—and worse for Shepard, Kaidan told himself. Obviously. But Shepard toughed it out in a January kind of way, like it was always January in Shepard’s world. Shepard and Dad shook hands once before the summer after high school happened, before Kaidan would’ve even conceived of it happening, and then there’d been the real possibility that they’d never have to shake again.

Kaidan shook if off. He wanted to tell Mom the mashed potatoes were good but it must’ve been instinct—not in hibernation like everything else this time of year—that kept him from opening his mouth and drawing more attention to the fact that he was the only one talking.

 

Dad could’ve said he liked the new glasses even if he didn’t like them. Most Dads would do that. And Kaidan knew that it was probably something worse than liking or disliking them: it was indifference, because Dad had no frame of reference for comparison and didn’t feel like bothering to create one.

 _For no reason_ , Kaidan’s brain added. It’d take up space, get in the way of the important stuff.

If he could’ve filled his brain with mashed potatoes—well, Kaidan was trying, anyway. When Dad wasn’t around, Mom let him taste her wine with dinner and he knew some basic pairings, what went with red meats and white meats, what came out when they were eating French or Spanish, that kind of thing.

He could’ve done with a sip, a glass to take the edge off discomfort. It’d still be there. He’d still feel it. But it’d be less somehow, smaller, quieter in his chest. Stored up and locked away with a cork to open up later.

Kaidan kept his head down. Sometimes, meeting Mom’s eyes across the table felt too much like conspiring, and those were the times—the January times—that Kaidan let his own guilt over the situation win out.

It wasn’t easy for Dad. He was basically the spokesperson for an invading force on foreign soil. Passing the master bathroom, seeing Dad’s stuff lined up on the sink, Kaidan felt like they had guests. And it wasn’t comfortable, and Dad didn’t know what to do with that, and the least Kaidan could do was make him feel at home. It wasn’t like he was around all the time.

Kaidan’s fork slipped, scraping the plate. He winced.

“Do you want seconds?” Mom asked.

Dad cleared his throat. Maybe it was an accident or bad timing or the rosemary on the spice rub for the chicken when he swallowed, or maybe it was the other thing. Disapproval. An A+ average in school, but Kaidan had been hitting B- with Dad since Christmas.

“I’m good,” Kaidan said, knowing he’d be in the kitchen at ten o’clock anyway: eating cold mashed potatoes out of the Tupperware, listening to the ceiling creak as Dad walked back and forth, no more times than were strictly necessary, getting ready for bed.

Mom licked her lips. Kaidan folded the corner of his napkin over his thigh, then smoothed out the wrinkle he’d created.

“We could watch a movie after dinner,” he said. That was stupid. The worst kind of stupid—asking a question you already knew the answer to, only hurting yourself when you heard it. “…But your flight’s pretty early.”

“It’s early,” Dad agreed. “No dessert, thank you.”

His chair slid away from the table without any friction. He folded his napkin into his plate and took it into the kitchen. It seemed so easy but only when he was gone.

“I should go make sure I’m packed,” Dad said. The guy always had a good exit strategy. Better than Shepard, anyway. At least Dad followed the statement with a reason.  
  
Mom nodded. “We’ve got the dishes.”  
  
Kaidan helped put away the leftovers and load the dishwasher. His mom filled the sink with soapy water and Kaidan sunk his hands in to scrub the bigger pots. The water was too hot and it hurt, but it felt necessary somehow. Penance, maybe. For a whole slew of transgressions that Kaidan couldn’t put words to.  
  
Mom didn’t say much and Kaidan didn’t have much to say. The silence didn’t lift when Dad left the room. They’d have to spend time rolling it up and shoving it aside again, because waiting for it to drift away like smoke wouldn’t work. It was that heavy. It was the Persian wool rug of silences.  
  
“There’s pumpkin pie,” Mom said when they were finished tidying up and the counters had been wiped down. She nodded toward the stove, where the untouched pie occupied a rear burner.  
  
“Yeah,” Kaidan said. It’d keep. He didn’t want to be the only one who took a chunk out of it because he knew Dad would see it in the morning before he left.  
  
Mom kissed his temple and squeezed his shoulder. She hip-checked the dishwasher shut and pressed the on switch, and then she left the room.  
  
“Yeah,” Kaidan said again, to himself. He was pulling at loose strings of silence, starting to unravel it. It was the kind of job you couldn’t do alone, though, and he was out of energy. His classes started on Monday. He needed to rest.  
  
Upstairs, he cracked open his laptop and tried to choose a movie to watch, but nothing grabbed him. He lay on his back with an arm slung over his stomach and stared at the black of the skylight. His desk lamp was on, so it was an empty void: no stars, no planes, nothing visible through the glass. Sometimes when he got really morose he’d wish that void would just open wide and swallow him.  
  
And then he’d think about what a stupid thing that was to wish for and that he didn’t wish for it at all.  
  
He was drifting off when he heard a shuffle outside the balcony window, followed by the telltale tap tap on the glass of his doors. He got up to let Shepard in.  
  
“Hey,” Shepard said. His nose and cheeks were pink. “Like old times, right?” There were no gloves on his hands and Kaidan could see that they were chafed from climbing the frozen tree. Shepard stepped inside and toed out of his high-tops. “It was pretty dead tonight so Kelly let me go early.”  
  
Kaidan shut the door and then rubbed Shepard’s ice cold fingers. “You need some gloves,” he said.  
  
“Oh.” Shepard patted himself down and then pulled a pair of flimsy drugstore gloves out of his coat pocket. He looked at them like he was seeing them for the first time. “Forget about ‘em.” He shrugged, one-shouldered.  
  
Kaidan hugged him and Shepard’s face was cold where the stubble on his jaw pressed into the side of Kaidan’s neck. Shepard had a lot more stubble, lately. And he smelled, perpetually, like coffee grounds and sweat. It was good, though. It didn’t matter.  
  
“Hey,” Shepard said again. Softer this time. One of his check-in heys, an are-you-okay hey. Kaidan squeezed him and then pulled away so Shepard could unzip his jacket. He slid out of it, folded it in half and tossed it onto the old brown couch at the foot of the bed. He was only wearing his work t-shirt.  
  
“I’m gonna get you a sweater,” Kaidan said. He walked over to the closest and started rifling for the warmest one. “And then I’m gonna get you something to eat.”  
  
When he turned around he caught Shepard investigating a fresh burn on his forearm with his thumb. He had an ongoing dispute with the espresso machine. Kaidan saw a subtle flinch in the corner of one freckled cheek, and he made a note to add _find a bandage_ to the Shepard to-do list. “Uh.” Shepard looked off to the side, like he had to think about what was already happening. “Sure,” he said. “Sounds good.”

“Unless you’re not hungry,” Kaidan said.

“Sounds good. Really.”

“You don’t have to be hungry.” Kaidan realized he was holding the sweater too tight when still holding onto it in the first place would’ve been too much. “Here. You wanna wait up here?”

“Sounds…” Shepard licked his lips, which Kaidan knew would be cold if he tried to kiss them. “I can come down too.”

“Yeah. It’s okay. I’ve got it.” Kaidan handed off the sweater. When Shepard took it, his fingers weren’t like ice anymore, but Kaidan could tell that the joints were still stiff. They’d bother him in the morning. It wasn’t something that’d disappear overnight. In a weird way, Kaidan realized it was nice to have to look after him, or to think he couldn’t look after himself. Not like this. Not when it came to the espresso machine or the gloves in his pocket.

And then, he realized how that sounded even inside his own head. Not very nice.

“Hey,” Shepard said, reaching after him.

But Kaidan wasn’t in the place where he could translate from Shepard hey-language into English for the long haul. All he had in him were concentrated sprints. “I’ll be right back,” he said. “You can turn up the thermostat if you want. It’s kind of cold in here.”

Shepard wouldn’t do that. Kaidan shut the door quietly, padding downstairs to grab a fork and the mashed potatoes. Shepard liked those—rosemary chicken, maybe not as much.

The kitchen had never been this dark, not since Kaidan was about three feet shorter and thought everything was bigger than it really was. Clouds had rolled in over the moon. It might’ve meant there’d be snow tomorrow but Kaidan knew not to expect anything other than sleet and slush, rain in the middle of the day, hardening to ice overnight.

If Dad’s flight got delayed because of the weather, then Mom had run out of her usual dinners. They could get take-in, eat it out of the boxes without looking at each other, while Dad pulled out his Blackberry to check the time every fifteen minutes but also to see if he had a new flight update.

Shepard was exactly where Kaidan had left him when Kaidan elbowed his way back into his room. Something Kaidan was supposed to be able to rely on, and he was working on that.

“Hey,” Shepard said again.

“Hey,” Kaidan agreed. “Mom made mashed potatoes. They’re really good.”

“Cool.” Shepard stirred them up. The heat from the microwave lingered on the air; Kaidan could see the steam rising against the black sky outside the balcony. “Yeah. They’re really good.” Shepard remembered to swallow, moving to wipe the corner of his mouth with a raised shoulder, stopping just before he got mashed potatoes on Kaidan’s sweater. _It’s fine_ , Kaidan wanted to tell him. _Seriously. It doesn’t matter. Even if you make a mess you can clean it up after._ “You…want some?”

“I’m fine,” Kaidan said. He sat on the edge of the bed but that was wrong. He stood again. He wanted Shepard to eat and get warmed up but he didn’t want it to come from anywhere else, not even one of his sweaters, not even his leftovers. He just wanted it to come from him.

Shepard put the Tupperware down and steadied the fork. He wiped his mouth with his knuckles, fingers that smelled like wet coffee grinds.

“Should I go?” Shepard asked.  
  
A new spin on an old classic. At least it was a question these days and not a statement. And at least Shepard looked settled, like leaving was never the plan to start with, just something he would be willing to do on Kaidan’s say-so.  
  
Kaidan ran his fingers through his own hair. It was too long again, way too long. It had been way too long at the end of November and he still hadn’t gotten it cut. He sighed. “No, it’s... It’s okay,” he said. He stood in front of the glass doors of his balcony, arms crossed over his chest.

“It’s kinda late,” Shepard said. “Should have texted you or, something.” 

“Nah, Shepard, it’s... It’s really fine.” _I’m just being weird_ , Kaidan thought, then, _I am weird_. Nothing new there.    
  
Shepard stood up. He tugged at the hem of Kaidan’s shirt, one quick pull like a little kid trying to get his attention, and then he sidled up and put his arms around him. Kaidan let his ear rest against the crook of Shepard’s throat. They both stared through the glass door at the dark yard, the frost-lined rooftops beyond the lane. The bare branches of all the neighborhood trees looked fragile and dormant. There wasn’t much sunlight to reach up toward even during the day.    
  
“Cold out,” Shepard said. “Roads are icy.”  
  
Kaidan had made Shepard swear up and down that he wouldn’t use the Normandy until the cold snap ended, so the motorcycle was tucked safely under a tarp in the parking lot beneath his building. Apollo’s was close enough to the apartment that Shepard could walk to work most days anyway.  
  
“Seems quiet,” Kaidan said.  
  
“Yeah. Only had about five customers tonight,” Shepard told him.  
  
“Everybody’s burned out. Post-Christmas burnout.” Happened every year, like clockwork. The January back-to-normals. January: the let-down. Kaidan rubbed his cheek on the collar of the sweater Shepard was wearing. His sweater, and Shepard was wearing it. “You should finish those mashed potatoes before they get cold,” he said.  
  
Shepard breathed in, then out. He said “Hmm,” and pulled away. They both sat down on the edge of the bed and Shepard picked up the Tupperware, wolfing down what was left of the food.  
  
Kaidan propped a pillow up against his wall and leaned back, eyelids half slung. He was thinking too much. Too hard. He was feeling too sorry for himself and, relatively, there wasn’t anything wrong. Just the Januaries.  
  
When Shepard finished eating he set everything down on the floor and licked the inside corner of his lips. He wiped his mouth on the back of his bare wrist as surreptitiously as he could manage and then crawled over and slotted himself in next to Kaidan. He was warm now. He gave off heat like a radiator once you got him going. A big, bony radiator with floppy hair and long limbs.  
  
He settled his head on Kaidan’s shoulder. “Thanks for the mashed potatoes.”  
  
“Yeah,” Kaidan said. “Sure. Any time, Shepard.”  
  
Shepard nodded at the laptop, which was still open on the corner of the bed. “You wanna watch something?” he asked.  
  
Kaidan slid his fingers under his glasses to rub at his eyes. “I’ve gotta wake up pretty early,” he said. “Say goodbye to my dad.”  
  
It was the final obligation Kaidan had for the visit. Rise in the dark to see Dad off in a cab, unless Mom had bullied him into letting her take him to the airport. She probably had, since he’d gone in a cab the last time.  
  
“Oh. Right.” Shepard broke into a yawn, finishing it off with a low whine as though he was an oversized puppy.  
  
It made Kaidan yawn too. “I’m... gonna get ready for bed,” he said afterward. Shepard let him up.

The light was already off under Mom’s door. When she was alone, it spilled out from underneath while she read until she fell asleep. Kaidan brushed his teeth without thinking about the difference in the house, his bathroom light set to dim. He didn’t get a good look at himself in the mirror and thought about the way Shepard looked at him instead.

That didn’t help as much as it used to but it was getting there, slowly, a reminder close to the jolt of happiness it used to give him: starting in his heart and his gut at the same time, then spreading outward from the center. It used to make his thighs flush.

It still did.

He managed something like a smile when he came back in. Shepard headed past him to use the mouthwash, probably, without even turning the light in the bathroom on. Kaidan turned down the blankets on the bed while Shepard slid in and shut the door behind him, making no noise at all—but Kaidan knew he was there.

Kaidan was the only one who did.

“You’ve gotta wake up early,” Shepard repeated, standing in front of the door, his hands empty and still damp by his sides. He never thought to use the hand-towels, like he thought he was going to make them dirty just by touching them. He wiped them on the fronts of his jeans instead. “So, I mean, you should go to sleep.”

“Gonna kiss you first,” Kaidan replied. He rubbed the corner of his eye with one knuckle, too hard, but it felt good at the time.

“Okay,” Shepard said.

He touched Kaidan at the hips, palming around to the small of his back. Kaidan’s sweater bunched under his fingers, knuckling against Kaidan’s spine. He kissed Kaidan’s jaw and Kaidan turned, maybe too fast, his mouth opening under Shepard’s, his tongue skimming Shepard’s bottom lip to his teeth and deeper.

“Okay,” Kaidan said. He shut his eyes, forehead to forehead. He caught his breath. He needed to go to bed.

“You say stuff like that, it might go to my head.” Shepard cleared his throat—an awkward chuckle or the burn of the mouthwash. But it wasn’t some kind of judgment and Kaidan even laughed with him.

“Not tonight,” Kaidan admitted. He hooked his thumbs into Shepard’s back pockets, giving him a tug closer—their hips bumped, and it was a good, physical, natural response. Mom gave them their privacy and Dad must’ve been asleep already, Ambien for nights before travel on the bedside table. Kaidan shook his head. All he had to do was shake it off. “…Come to bed, though.”

Shepard’s breath hissed between his teeth. He followed Kaidan until Kaidan’s legs hit the mattress and they went back onto it.

“You want me to get the light?” Shepard asked.

“Sure,” Kaidan said. “Thanks.”

Shepard leaned out of his arms and reached the lamp. Kaidan closed his eyes, waiting for the sound of the switch before he pulled Shepard back again, kissing his throat.

“Thanks for coming over,” he added. Shepard’s pulse jumped and steadied. Kaidan always knew where the freckles were. Some of them were sensitive.

“Thanks for the mashed potatoes,” Shepard replied, swallowing.

His lips rested on Kaidan’s forehead. His breath was warm, just like his chest. His sweater smelled like Kaidan’s closet and Kaidan’s detergent and coffee underneath that, because there was no amount of changing Shepard that could actually change him.

Shepard was half-hard in his jeans, too, and Kaidan felt a flickering gnaw of guilt. Good guilt, though. He’d done that. He’d gotten Shepard riled with his mouth and his touch and Shepard had touched back and wanted him. It might have been mean, but there was something nice about knowing it.  
  
Kaidan fell asleep to the rhythmic pressure of Shepard’s breathing moving in and out behind his ribs.  
  
The sound of the alarm clock made Kaidan groan. The last time he’d heard it was on the day of his polysci final in early December, and since then he’d forgotten how much he hated the high-pitched, blaring ring.  
  
Shepard reached out and flicked it off in one smooth, wide-awake motion. Shepard always woke up first. One of his secret powers that Kaidan worried stemmed from the way he’d had to live when he was little: constantly alert, constantly on guard. Like a rabbit ready to bolt at any given moment.  
  
He was too solid to be much of a rabbit. They’d barely shifted in their sleep—and Shepard might have been skinny but he was all bone and muscle. He’d only gotten taller since high school.  
  
“How’re you so heavy anyway,” Kaidan mumbled. His arms were locked around him to keep him from moving.  
  
“Sorry,” Shepard said against his temple.  
  
They breathed quietly that way for a couple of minutes, but Kaidan could hear movement downstairs. Shepard could too. He’d perked. It was nothing visible, but he had this way of tensing, something far under the skin. His tendons went rigid and he vibrated on a different wavelength.  
  
“We’d better...” Kaidan started.  
  
“Yeah,” Shepard agreed.  
  
They disentangled. Shepard clicked the bedside lamp, and soft orange light flooded the room. Kaidan swiped at his eyes with the heels of his palms, then slid his glasses on. He got up and steadied himself on his feet, then went to his bedroom door. Shepard was lingering by the edge of the mattress. He was up, but he was in one of his in-between states. A few months ago it would have been a given that he’d stay upstairs, out of sight, out of the line of fire. Now, the lines weren’t so clearly drawn.  
  
“You don’t have to come down,” Kaidan said. His fingers were on the door handle.  
  
In-between state Shepard wavered for a few seconds longer, and then stepped forward. “It’s okay,” he said. _I’ve got your back_ , he didn’t say, but he might as well have.  
  
Kaidan opened the door and the two of them padded downstairs.  
  
The kitchen was brightly lit, and the smell of brewing coffee wafted out. Dad’s bags, two identical black suitcases, were already set side by side at the front door. Mom flew out of the kitchen with equally identical to-go mugs of coffee in her hands.  
  
She looked up at Kaidan and then her eyes widened and softened again at the sight of Shepard. “Oh! John, when did you get here?”  
  
“Uh. Late,” Shepard said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Good morning Mrs. Alenko.” His ears were pink at the tips like they always were when he came to dinner or knocked on the front door or talked to Kaidan’s mom for more than three minutes.  
  
“Good morning,” Mom replied. She leaned against the banister and put one of the mugs down on it so she could reach up to smooth Kaidan’s bedhead. “Sweetie, I’m running your dad to the airport and then I have a nine o’clock downtown, so you’re on your own until after lunch.”  
  
“Okay,” Kaidan said.  
  
“Florence?” Dad’s voice from the kitchen. “Have you got the keys?”  
  
“Yup,” Mom called back. “We should get going.”  
  
Dad came out of the kitchen holding half a piece of toast smothered in marmalade. If he was surprised to see Shepard, he didn’t show it. “Good morning,” he said. Non-specific. No eye contact.  
  
“Good morning,” Kaidan and Shepard chorused. It was awkward. It still would have been awkward if Shepard wasn’t standing behind Kaidan on the bottom step.  
  
Mom had cracked the front door open. Cold air sucked into the house.  
  
“Well,” Dad said. “I’ll see you in March.”  
  
“Yeah,” Kaidan said.  
  
This was the part Kaidan hated. Neither of them knew what to do, but because Mom was watching they had to make some effort at being father and son. So dad leaned close and Kaidan let him and he smelled like wool and aftershave and they both gave one another a solid pat on the back—and that was that.

It was over in less than two seconds.  
  
Dad turned away and stuffed his toast into his mouth so he could pick up his bags, then trotted down the front steps towards the car. The CRV’s hatch was already popped and waiting. It was still pitch dark out and there was a quick wind nipping through the evergreen hedge. Particles of frost swirled over the cement of the walkway. It looked slippery, but Dad kept his footing.    
  
Kaidan walked to the doorway and Mom pecked him on the cheek before darting out into the morning chill. He stood with the door open and watched Dad toss the two suitcases into the back of the car. Mom hopped in behind the wheel and the lights went on, and Dad climbed into the passenger side.  
  
They pulled away from the curb a few seconds later. Kaidan lifted his hand high enough to wave. He thought he saw Dad lift his back, but it was too dark to say for certain.  
  
He didn’t realize he was standing there staring out in the freezing cold until Shepard touched the small of his back with warm fingers. Kaidan startled. He shut the door.  
  
Everything hit him at once, right in the chest, right in the heart. Every look that went unanswered, every conversation that started and ended with hello. Every dismissive agreement and indifferent remark and passively disapproving cleared throat. It had all been left on that curb when Dad got into the car and drove off, and it all spun around and smashed straight back into Kaidan who’d been left behind with the real baggage, who didn’t get to check it at the airport.  
  
Kaidan turned and crushed his face into Shepard’s chest. Tears burned his eyes and he felt like his head, his whole body, was caught in a vice.  
  
Shepard staggered on impact but he rebalanced fast. Kaidan gripped Shepard’s sweater, bunching it with cramped fingers.  
  
“He doesn’t love me,” Kaidan said. He sucked in an uneven breath. His head felt too full. “He doesn’t...”  
  
He trailed off on another jagged inhalation. No other words would come. 

*

Clean-up in the Alenko hallway, Shepard thought.

He wasn’t employee of the month and, back when he’d worked at Thrifty’s, nobody’d ever called him to mop up spills or restack specials. He just wasn’t that guy.

Sometimes, when he tried to help Mrs. Alenko clean up after dinner, he’d break a plate or a cup. He could get all the way to the dishwasher and start to load it and it’d happen then; suddenly, he’d be all elbows and thumbs.

But they didn’t put out paper or plastic for him. He didn’t know if that was crazy or they could afford to buy new plates or what, but he wasn’t the guy to clean up then, either.

“Stand back,” Mrs. Alenko said, reaching for the dustpan, sweeping up the shards of glass or the chunks of porcelain.

Somewhere, there had to be a list. Like notches on the doorframe for Kaidan’s height between the living room and the front hallway—number of dishes Shepard’s broken, carved into the bottom of the table in the kitchen. Shepard had checked once. He felt like James Bond when he did it, then pretended he’d dropped something when Mrs. Alenko peered inside and asked him if everything was okay.

And she still let him come over.

She still said hello when Shepard said hello, the word sticking in his throat like that time Garrus dared him to swallow an entire jawbreaker without sucking on it first. _Hey_ was more his thing.

He was the hey guy, not the hello guy.

Kaidan was crying on him.

It was wet and messy, mostly scary. Shepard had trained with the best—he’d trained with Garrus Vakarian—but it wasn’t like he could grab a paintball gun and bike after Mr. Alenko and shoot him blue in the middle of the airport.

Well, he could, but it wouldn’t be good. And besides, he’d promised Kaidan he wouldn’t ride Normandy when the streets were icy.

Outside, it’d started raining. Shepard could hear the wind rocking the windowpanes and the door in its frame. It felt like years since Kaidan had started crying but it’d been a second or two at the most, just a couple of heartbeats, not long enough that was over and just long enough that Shepard realized he hadn’t trained for this.

Kaidan needed him.

That was big.

 _Never panic_ —that was Garrus’s big advice. Shepard could hear it in his dry voice but that was over the sound of Kaidan’s ragged breathing, trying to catch his breath and hiccupping on it instead.

Shepard didn’t panic. Not exactly. Kaidan had knotted the front of his sweater between his fingers, tugging it away from Shepard’s chest, which hurt—but only because Shepard had stopped breathing.

“He doesn’t love me,” Kaidan said. “He doesn’t…”

 _That’s crazy_ , Shepard thought.

That was crazy.

There was no way somebody could know Kaidan without loving him.

His hair was curly, messy—from sleeping on Shepard’s chest, from not combing it before he headed down, from the humidity. He had his new glasses—not the old ones, and they took some getting used to, but Shepard liked them because Kaidan liked them.

_That’s crazy._

Kaidan made Shepard a little crazy.

“I love you,” Shepard said. Like Kaidan had asked him if he was hungry and he’d said yeah, sure, he could go for some breakfast, _what about you?_ Like Kaidan had asked him if he was off work tomorrow and he’d said probably not, but he’d have to check his schedule. Like Kaidan had said ‘Hey’ and Shepard had said ‘ _Hey_ ’ back. Instinct. Reflex. It just came out. And once it was out, it wasn’t his anymore. It was Kaidan’s. _He_ was Kaidan’s. “ _I_ love you,” Shepard said again.

Because just once wasn’t too much. He had to do it twice and make it about him, which it wasn’t.

It never had been.

Kaidan wasn’t saying anything.

He didn’t need to; Shepard thought, _I should go_. He thought _I love you_ some more, how it was okay, how it was true, how it wasn’t always okay, and how he still didn’t care that thinking about it hurt. All the usual stuff when he closed his eyes and thought about Kaidan—which was whenever he closed his eyes. It just had words now, just three of them.

Shepard swallowed. Kaidan wasn’t saying anything and he wasn’t moving much either—his back shuddered now and then when he hiccupped for air, and his fists were still balled tight in the sweater. Shepard realized he was probably wrecking it, which was bad because it was Kaidan’s sweater—a nice wool one with a knitted pattern down the front, not some worn out thing of Shepard’s that didn’t matter.  
  
“You’re ruining your sweater,” Shepard said. What an idiotic thing to say to someone who was crying, especially after two I love yous. He swallowed again.

Kaidan squeaked, but it wasn’t a word. It reminded Shepard of the noises Anderson’s arthritic old dog used to make when the weather was bad. Achy; hurting. Shepard put his hands on Kaidan’s sides and rubbed them up and down, trying to get him warm again even though he wasn’t exactly cold.  
  
Sometimes, all you could do was wait out the storm. Shepard had waited out his share in less comfortable places than a brightly lit front hallway. He’d said stupider things than “you’re ruining your sweater,” too, but not at worse times. Kaidan was more important than Kaidan’s sweater.  
  
And Kaidan was still crying. Shepard’s cheek twitched.  
  
Another squeak; then, the fists that were tangled up in the sweater went slack. Kaidan lifted his face until the wet tip of his nose touched Shepard’s adam’s apple. One of his hands palmed the side of Shepard’s neck and climbed higher, until his thumb was stroking along a cheekbone. The skin on Shepard’s throat was moist with Kaidan’s breath where he was exhaling against one spot, over and over.  
  
“I love you, too,” Kaidan said into Shepard’s skin. It was sad and quiet and he meant it. Shepard could tell he meant it. Something thudded hard in Shepard’s chest and he closed his eyes.  
  
They held still for a minute. Icy rain pattered the frozen ground outside, punctuated every so often by a sniffle from Kaidan. The corner of Kaidan’s glasses poked into a soft spot under Shepard’s jaw and Shepard reached up to gently pull them off. If they were poking him then they had to be bothering Kaidan—the way his face was mashed into Shepard’s sternum was probably jamming them into the bridge of his nose. Kaidan tilted his head so that the frames slid off easier. The lenses were streaked with tears.  
  
Shepard lowered his chin, nudging Kaidan’s temple. “You wanna go back to sleep?” he asked.  
  
Kaidan gulped and wiped at his eye. “Yeah,” he said. He turned his face and stray curls tickled Shepard’s jaw. “‘m sorry, Shepard,” Kaidan whispered. “For... for freaking out.”  
  
“Hey,” Shepard said, “it’s okay.” He knit his fingers with Kaidan’s and took a step toward the stairs. He led and Kaidan followed, eyes down, free hand cradling half his face like he was holding back a headache.    
  
In the bedroom, with the door shut behind them, Kaidan finally looked up at Shepard. Usually when Shepard looked hard into Kaidan’s eyes his mind shot a million light-years away. Kaidan’s eyes were so dark—deep and distant. There were worlds in there: orbits and fractals and complex patterns, lights and shadows. But today, Kaidan’s eyes weren’t masked. They weren’t quickened with thousand-mile-an-hour thoughts beyond Shepard’s comprehension. They were the sad brown eyes of a confused, sick kid, and it twisted Shepard up inside because he’d seen that look before in his own eyes, glinting back blue in every mirror he’d ever faced.

Nobody deserved to feel like that.  
  
Shepard pulled Kaidan into his chest and held on, tight enough that all the air went out of his own lungs. He bumped his nose against Kaidan’s and kissed him. Clumsy, maybe too hard. His lips were salty.

“My lips are salty,” Kaidan said.

_M’lips’r salty._

“ _Our_ lips are salty,” Shepard replied.

So that was what it felt like to be a know-it-all. It wasn’t about being right or wrong even if it sounded like it was. Shepard swallowed and Kaidan’s hiccup turned into something like a chuckle, wet and dry at the same time, all wrung out from the inside. Shepard touched Kaidan’s flushed cheek, rubbing the reddest spot. Kaidan sucked in a breath and it didn’t make a hollow. His lips really were wet—salty, like he’d said. Shepard kissed them again until it was something they shared.

“Okay,” Kaidan said. “Okay, I… Yeah.”

“You’re even starting to sound like me.” Shepard found a streak—salty again—on Kaidan’s chin and went after it. The skin was warm. The flush was real, not feverish. Kaidan’s mouth was still sad. Shepard kissed it until—what would Kaidan have said?—until he restored equilibrium. Not perfect, not smiling, not that happy, but back at square one. They were always breaking things down and building them back up again.

Kaidan’s hiccup-chuckle stuck in his throat; Shepard kissed his throat. Kaidan was still doing everything he could to ruin his sweater with fingers that didn’t know how to let go and Shepard, who was supposed to stop stuff like that, wasn’t stopping it.

“You really…” Kaidan stopped before he could finish. In between thoughts, like a bookmark or a post-it note or a folded down page, he kissed Shepard’s bottom lip. He tugged it, tasted it. _Salty_ , Shepard thought. “Okay,” Kaidan said again.

“You really too,” Shepard replied.

Kaidan looked up at him, his face threatening to crumple. He still looked lost; it wasn’t Shepard he needed. His mom, maybe. Mrs. Alenko knew what to do. She was one of those people. _Clean-up in Kaidan’s bedroom,_ Shepard could tell her, waiting for her in the hallway, stepping aside to let her do her thing.

But more than that, it was what Kaidan was missing that he needed most. Which could’ve been why he needed Shepard—but now it was Shepard’s head that was hurting.

“We’re talking like cavemen,” Kaidan said. “Or…Tarzan.”

“You Kaidan,” Shepard agreed.

“You…John,” Kaidan said.

It was weird. Chilly. Kaidan’s warm body surged up against Shepard’s chest and he was saying something, _thanks_ , between kisses. Like a bookmark. A post-it. A folded down page. Shepard should’ve told him he still didn’t know how to study. And he didn’t need any footnotes, any special translation.

For no reason at all, the burn on Shepard’s arm started hurting.

“I’m sorry,” Kaidan said again.

“For freaking out.”

“Yeah. But, I mean… I do that a lot. Sometimes I think it might be my thing.”

That’s okay, Shepard thought. It was okay because Kaidan loved him.

The first time he’d said it—Shepard couldn’t let that night count. It was Kaidan trying to save his place. It hurt more than it was supposed to; Shepard was sure of that. The way his voice sounded had been like a busted in bike wheel, metal warped and twisted, tire punctured. No air. No speed. Nothing but the spokes still turning because the brakes were busted too. And Shepard left with his head ringing, a bruise he didn’t even know how to ice. Not that he would’ve if he had. He knew he didn’t deserve to get that kind of healing.

“I like your thing,” Shepard said. “I…love your thing.”

“You too,” Kaidan replied. “I love a lot—most of your things.”

Shepard bit his lip to keep from grinning. It happened anyway, awkward and lop-sided around the teeth caught on his lip, and Kaidan laughed at the expression; a real laugh. He used the ball of his thumb to wipe a last dot of moisture out of the corner of his eye, and then they were kissing again.  
  
The blankets were still rumpled in a heap at the foot of the bed. Hell, the bed was practically still warm. All told, they’d only spent about ten minutes out of it. Time was strange, the way it bent and stretched and suddenly sped up again. Kaidan would know why; at least scientifically speaking. Liara would know why even better. Garrus would shake his head—his _have I taught you nothing_ headshake—and say “Time is an illusion, Shepard.”  
  
Shepard clicked the light back off and Kaidan nuzzled close. His cheeks were still hot and his sideburn was sticky when Shepard ran his fingers over it. He pushed his hand back into Kaidan’s thick curls and sucked in a huge breath of him; his shampoo, his skin. It made Shepard sleepy.  
  
It was the only thing that really made Shepard sleepy.    
  
Flecks of icy rain scratched across the skylight. They tapped on the balcony doors. He wondered suddenly if that was confusing, sometimes, for Kaidan. If the rain ever hit the glass a certain way and sounded like him dropping in unannounced at midnight on a Wednesday. If it was worse when that was a sound you were waiting up for, never knowing if it would come or not.  
  
“Hey,” Shepard whispered. “You ever think the rain was me, Kaidan?” It sounded a little funny, when he said it out loud.  
  
Kaidan shifted. He tucked one of his arms between them and rubbed Shepard’s chest with his knuckles. “Yeah,” he said. “A few times.”  
  
Kaidan, opening his balcony door in the dark, hoping Shepard was standing in the pouring rain on the other side of it. Kaidan closing it again when there was nothing there but water, nothing but air.  
  
That was a lot less funny.  
  
Shepard had forgotten to breathe again. He pulled in another deep breath and decided he would use the front door next time. He would come in the right way. He would do one thing right. The difference between inside and outside, the distinction between being in Kaidan’s bed and being in a bed without Kaidan, between climbing a tree and knocking on a door; it was that Kaidan loved him.  
  
He loved Kaidan. It was January and he was in love with Kaidan.  
  
That was new, and it wasn’t new at all—time, an illusion. Shepard’s heart beat slow and strong behind his ribs. He was messed up, but Kaidan could get messy too, and it didn’t matter. They were both tired.  
  
Kaidan hummed a few soft noises that might have been words inside his head, and Shepard knew he was already falling asleep.  
  
“Yeah,” Shepard agreed. “Love you, too.”

 **END**   


End file.
